(… as I down my breakfast before getting to the reed situation …)
Watching bassoonist Stephen Paulson and English hornist Julie Ann Giacobassi take apart that famous opening almost measure by measure is a true thrill.
Say! What’s this? You know you wanna know!
San Francisco Symphony has a new thing goin’ on. It’s called Keeping Score. You [...]
BOO!
hoo …
Tis a scary and sad day … until those EH reeds get made!
Reading over at The Reedery
But I be slightly hyper as well … typical after a performance. Even when it’s something as light as musical theatre. (Yes, I take musical theatre as seriously as anything. I feel that to think of one form of music as unimportant is simply a very bad idea, as it can lead to sloppy playing. [...]
I’m home. But not for long.
I had a rehearsal this afternoon, but rather than go out to dinner downtown I came home. I can at least see Jameson and Dan for a brief moment, and I got some tasty pizza out of it too. (Thanks, Dan!) Now it’s back to work.
I wish I [...]
It’s 11:20 PM and I’m already home! Nice, eh? Our rehearsal that was scheduled from 6:30 to 11:30 got out early.
I’m so relieved.
This was a very long day, due to some family stuff, then symphony, and then the rehearsal. And of course it feels as if it’s an hour later than it is [...]
Personally, I think the audience should applaud for the oboist who gives the ‘A’ rather than the concertmaster, who only walks out without falling off the stage!
-Fredric Cohen (the just retired oboist of the Springfield Symphony Orchestra)
I’m with him. Excellent idea! You can read the entire article here.
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Getting on stage tends to wake a person up just fine. I enjoyed the concert, and once again my friend and colleague, Pam Hakl, did a beautiful job! :-)
Now I set my clock back an hour. I love that extra hour! Tomorrow it’s a 2:30 performance and then I have a five hour rehearsal for [...]
It’s 6:15. I will leave for the hall at 7:15. At 8:00 we will be starting the concert. And right now I’m very, very tired. I’m having a very difficult time imagining playing. The thought of picking up an oboe is beyond me.
But come 8:00—no, come 7:30—when I warm up (they have a concert [...]
I ran across Out West Arts (probably from someone’s link and I’m sorry I can’t tell you whose because I can’t remember!) and I think I’ll enjoy it.
The blogger, Brian, is in Los Angeles, but he treks on up here to see things (not in San José, or course, but in San Francisco where [...]
Now and then, a pork chop eagerly shares a shower with the tuba player living with a customer. A plaintiff completely seeks a polar bear. A movie theater shares a shower with a chestnut. An eggplant gives a pink slip to the tuba player. For example, a single-handledly impromptu bullfrog indicates that a class action [...]
If I have a hectic schedule I tend to not look ahead. It’s so difficult for my brain to wrap around one week, much less look forward to the next. This doesn’t mean I don’t know what’s coming up; I’m well aware that the next two weeks will be The King and I, with a [...]
I thought last night’s Symphony Silicon Valley concert went well. Pam played beautifully in the Bizet and got a well deserved bow. Much to my surprise the conductor had me stand after Pam. It’s true that the slow movement solo gets passed to the second oboe, but it never entered my mind that it would [...]
There’s a new classical music blog I’ll be checking out. Now you can too.
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In response to my last post …
So we went over the oboe’s range. I talked about what is difficult with oboe. Darn low notes. Please don’t have us trill a low B flat to low B! Give really high notes to the flutes, doggone it. (But, “Yes, we can play some high notes and see [...]
I’m on the UCSC campus right now. My first student (who comes at a very early 8:30) is ill, so I had a bit of time to ready myself for a orchestration class where I’ll be demonstrating the oboe.
It’s always an interesting thing .. deciding what to tell them. What I’d love to say [...]
Whew! Another long day. My mouth is pretty darn fried. Five rehearsals in two days is just a bit much for me, I think.
But … well … wasn’t it just so fun to realize you were reading words I typed while on the stage?!
Please don’t tell me you really didn’t even care. I don’t [...]
At this very moment I am sitting on the stage of the California Theatre. This is the first of two rehearsals today and we are on our fifteen minute break.
Isn’t wireless TOO COOL?!
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One more, before I leave …
Oboe players are seriously nuts. … Oboists suffer from a serious Santa Claus complex, spending all their waking hours carving little wooden toys for imaginary children, although they will tell you they are putting the finishing touches on the world’s greatest reed ….
Read the rest over at daily observations. (Not [...]
Now if you’ve never seen the Dylan video, Ginsberg and all, this might not mean as much to you. But still …!
Seen first
For those of you who wonder what a busy musical day might be like, here goes …
Not included in the musical part of the day is waking at 6:30 to take Jameson to school. (Thankfully Dan gets up earlier to get lunches made and all. Whew!) When I got home I went over all that [...]
Last week I blogged (whined?) about a bad practice session. I’m happy to report that today is a much better day. Happier reeds=happier me. And yes, I played in between last Wednesday and today, but I hadn’t given an update earlier and this is about now and not about then and certainly not about later. [...]
I could imagine this one, actually.
I do wonder, though, if they’d ever get the rights … and if Sondheim would do it. I thought I read somewhere that he said he wasn’t going to be composing any longer. Hmmm. Maybe I read wrong. I’d like to be wrong. About that at least.
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Thanks to ACB I was fortunate enough to read this article. :-)
It ends with this:
My hope is to combine my two joys: to watch Ravens on television with the sound turned down while listening to a live opera broadcast on radio. I am looking forward to the first Saturday in January. That is when I [...]
Read on a review:
…even the orchestra applauded before the soloist returned for a brief and flashy encore …
So tell me, when do orchestras not applaud a soloist? It’s what we do. It’s polite. It’s correct. And if we didn’t we’d look pretty darn bad, don’t you think?
Not to say most soloists shouldn’t get our [...]
I have to race otu the door, and I plan on replying to emails and site comments asap, but while you are dying for my responses, here’s a bit ‘o spam nonsense for you to enjoy. Really.:
Most people believe that a food stamp figures out a cowboy, but they need to remember how hesitantly an [...]
